Chris Evans, the Member of Parliament for Caerphilly, and Hefin David MS, the Member of the Senedd for Caerphilly, have issued a joint letter raising concerns about the UK Government’s plans to reform welfare.
In a letter to Liz Kendall MP, the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, Mr. Evans and Dr. David raised the deep concerns that have been expressed by their constituents about plans to change the eligibility for Personal Independence Payments, Universal Credit rates, and scrapping the Work Capability Assessment.
The MP and MS highlighted that the proposed changes could lead to 13,000 people in Caerphilly losing financial support, making it one of the 10 hardest hit areas across the UK.
They called for the UK Government to consult with those who could be affected, to mitigate the effects of the proposals and fully understand the likely impacts.
Mr. Evans has also signed a parliamentary amendment to the Universal Credit and Personal Independence Payments Bill which aims to block the changes from becoming law in their current form.
Mr. Evans said: “Our welfare system needs reform, that much is clear. However, the proposals before us could have a serious and detrimental impact on my constituents, particularly those with disabilities, which could drive many into further poverty.
“I am calling on the Government to urgently reconsider these proposals and address the concerns that have been raised by so many people. At the very least, they must fully consult with those likely to be affected and protect them from slipping into poverty.”
Dr. David said: “The Welsh Labour Government has committed to ensuring that disabled people are supported into employment and receive appropriate job coaching. I am concerned that the unintended consequences of the benefits reforms will work against that progress in helping disabled people. I urge the UK Government listen to the Welsh Government’s strong views on this.”
The Universal Credit and Personal Independence Payments Bill is due to be debated by MPs at its second reading on Tuesday, 1st July 2025.
A copy of the letter can be found below
FAO The Rt. Hon. Liz Kendall MP
Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
Department for Work and Pensions
Caxton House
London
SW1H 9NA
24th June 2025
Dear Liz,
We write jointly as Member of Parliament and Member of the Senedd for Caerphilly in response to the Pathways to Work: Reforming Benefits and Support to Get Britain Working Green Paper published in March, and the Universal Credit and Personal Independence Payment Bill published in June.
The proposals contained in the green paper and the bill have generated significant interest and in many cases deep concern among our constituents. Many of our constituents feel these proposals have been introduced with very little advance warning. They are fearful of what the impacts will be for them and their families.
Our response is informed and guided by the input of our constituents and wider national and local civic society organisations who have commented on the proposals.
We agree with the broad principles that our social security system is overdue reform to fix many of its shortcomings. It is imperative that we stop people falling into long-term economic inactivity where we can, restore trust in the system, provide high quality employment support, and focus on those who need it most. Above all, we must ensure people who cannot work due to health reasons may live in dignity, with the support they need.
However, we have serious concerns about parts of the green paper and bill as published. Many of the most common are detailed below.
All policy proposals benefit from robust and genuine public input, especially from those who are most impacted by any proposal. Public contributions of this kind provide the UK Government with the evidence and feedback it needs to make good decisions, identify unintended consequences, and ultimately improve draft proposals.
We are concerned that some of the most impactful elements are not being consulted on. These include proposals to alter the eligibility criteria for Personal Independence Payments (PIP), changes to Universal Credit (UC) rates, and scrapping the Work Capability Assessment (WCA).
We believe these have far reaching consequences. A full and thorough consultation with those impacted would enable the UK Government to understand these consequences more fully and make any necessary adjustments.
The proposed changes to PIP eligibility, in particular requiring claimants to score at least four points in one activity to receive the daily living component, could leave well over one million existing claimants at risk of losing access and therefore significant financial support. Changes to the UC health element could impact over 700,000 future claimants who may lose access to vital support.
We have taken evidence from late-diagnosed autistic adults. We feel that the removal of benefit from undiagnosed neurodivergent people will have an adverse impact on their lives and their ability to work. We ask that all benefit support remains while individuals with clinically recognised mental health conditions are seeking an ASD diagnosis. The NHS waiting times for these assessments can be two years or more in Wales. It would be deeply unfair for these people who are on an NHS waiting list to lose benefits prior to diagnosis.
It is clear, from the UK Government’s own impact assessment and estimates, that the PIP change alone is expected bring a quarter of a million working-age adults into poverty by 2029/30, while many already in poverty will be in deeper poverty. Many of these impacted adults will have dependent children.
Research led by Policy in Practice has found that Wales, and Caerphilly, are among the areas expected to be hardest hit by the proposals as they stand. About 190,000 people across Wales could lose financial support. Approximately 13,000 of these would be in Caerphilly, which represents just under 8% of the total population. In Caerphilly, this represents a financial impact of £35 million. The numbers are very similar in some of our neighbouring local authorities, including Blaenau Gwent and Merthyr Tydfil. Caerphilly and these two neighbouring authorities will be among the 10 hardest hit areas in the UK.
PIP is also a key gateway to other forms of support. This includes the UC health element, and various other passported support including benefit top-ups, council tax discounts, travel support, and exemptions to the benefit cap. There are also impacts for Carers Allowance and the carer’s element of UC. The loss of PIP together with the loss of these other forms of support would have a further cumulative impact, further contributing to poverty.
Places such as Lansbury Park, Graig Y Rhacca, parts of Penyrheol, Gelligaer, Hengoed and others in Caerphilly are strong communities, but they are also among the most deprived on the Welsh Index of Multiple Deprivation. Altogether, 10 LSOAs in Caerphilly are among the 10% most deprived in Wales.
Poverty has many serious impacts, as you know. The impacts on the individual are considerable, often resulting in those individuals requiring support from public services. As health outcomes worsen with poverty, so too do their demands on the health and social care services. Schools are impacted when more children are in poverty, and educational outcomes are harmed. Crime and poverty are positively correlated, raising demands on the police and criminal justice system.
These additional pressures on vital public services will require additional government spending, undermining the wider financial sustainability of these proposals. Many of these front-line services that may be impacted are devolved, which would add further pressure to the budgets of devolved governments including the Welsh Government, and Local Authorities, if demand rises with higher poverty levels.
In the context of long-term funding issues for authorities like Caerphilly County Borough Council (CCBC), it is reasonable to expect that demand on front-line services will increase sharply if 13,000 people lose out because of these proposals. This can only create further funding pressures for CCBC, at a time when the authority is already being forced to make extremely difficult and impactful financial choices. We believe the Government must work with authorities like CCBC and the Welsh Government to fully understand what the impacts will be, and how the Government can support them.
We feel the UK Government must fully understand the impact of these proposals, and at minimum should consult with those who will be impacted by them. It should take actions to ensure that nobody is forced into poverty because of these proposals.
We welcome the proposed significant additional £1.8 billion investment into employment support for those who are currently out of work for health reasons.
However, we are concerned that the amount of people helped by this investment could be far smaller than the number of people who will lose income because of the proposals. Based on the success of previous schemes, the Learning and Work Institute have estimated that 45,000 – 95,000 disabled people will be helped into work because of the investment. This is welcome, but it only represents 3% of those who will lose financial support under the existing proposals over the next four years.
In Caerphilly, where 13,000 people may lose support, this would equate to 390 people being helped into work. It is unclear at present how the other 12,610 losing support without being helped into work would manage significant drops in their income.
We are concerned that this is only a very small fraction of those impacted and would appear to undermine the logic of the proposed changes which were to help people into work. We believe the UK Government must consider this point very carefully, because it will mean people are expected to lose their existing incomes before they find new sources of income through work. We believe the UK Government must consider introducing transition arrangements for people in this category.
We have lobbied the Welsh Government to consider job coaching, supported employment and employer support grants as part of their 2027 Employability Programme. We would like the UK Government to work closely with the Welsh Government to help develop this programme and deliver the necessary funding. We believe that a National Job Coaching Service for learning disabled people will be vital in enabling them to work. We have seen evidence of the success of this in Cardiff University’s Engage to Change programme, led by Learning Disability Wales, which provided employment support to 1,300 young people with a learning difficulty, learning disability and/or autism over a 7- year period. The project had a success rate of 41% of young people securing a paid job, compared to a UK national average of 4.8%. This support ended with the closure of the programme on 31st May 2023. We believe that the evidence clearly demonstrates the value of government intervention in this area.
Overall, while our welfare system needs reform, in practice we feel there are serious problems in these proposals that need addressing. The UK Government must do everything it can to avoid pushing people into poverty, and to ensure that the proposed reforms are effective at meeting their stated objectives. This will involve thorough consultation, which would contribute towards a very robust assessment of all impacts and consequences of these proposals.
We would be very grateful if you could consider these points and let us have your comments.
Yours sincerely,
Chris Evans MP
Member of Parliament for Caerphilly
Dr. Hefin David MS
Member of the Senedd for Caerphilly
